beginners question about permissions?

[casmok]

One of the things I dont quite understand is Permissions. Well I sort of do (emphasis on sort of here!) Theres a tutorial on Psychocats but that comes more from the command line perspective. Here's what I cant figure out and want to do:

In the /home/"user name"/examples directory there are a pile of example files that I'd like to delete. I cant delete them as they are root permission and if I go to properties it wont let me change the permissions as "I'm not the owner"

So how do I change the permissions? I'd like to know how to do this by both the command line AND on the GUI if possible.

Many thanks
Mike

[LowSky]

there is no way to do it from the GUI, sorry at leat not in Ubuntu (you canot log in with Root)
from a gnome terminal

gksu nautilus

it will open the file manager with root access... what ever you delete will be gone forever, be careful

[taurus]

In this case, change the ownership of those files from root to your login name would allow you to do whatever you want with those files, deleting them if you wish.

cd ~/examples
sudo chown username *

Replace username with your login name.

Or delete them with root privilege.

cd ~/examples
sudo rm *

[kanikilu]

If those example files accidentally got owned by root, the easiest way to deal with it in a GUI is to start nautilus with gksudo. Ironically, this has to be done with the commandline. Press ALT+F2 or go to Applications > Accessories > Terminal and type:

gksudo nautilus

enter your password when asked, and a file manager window owned by root should show up. Now just browse to /home/username and you can delete those example files.

Alternatively, you can do it all from the commandline. Open a terminal and you should be in your home directory. Now you can use

sudo chown username exampleFile

to change the ownership of exampleFile to your account. Then use rm to remove the files.

For more information

man rm
man chown
man chgrp
man chmod

[vanadium]

"/home/"user name"/examples" is a symbolic link pointing to a common system directory where you do not have permissions. If you want to "customize" this directory:

1) rename "examples" to "examples_old"
2) Create a new directory "examples"
3) Copy all files from "examples_old" to "examples"
4) Delete "examples_old" (you are only deleting the link)
5) Change "examples" to your heart's content.

[protargol]

To change the permissions on the files you can use the 'chmod' command.

There are several ways to use that command to change permissions for the owner, group, and others.

One example is:

chmod 644 file

This will give the owner read and write permissions, while the group and others will only have read-only permission.

If you are not the owner, you'll have to add sudo to the beginning in order to overcome that.

But taurus is correct in pointing out that you could just change ownership to remove them.

[casmok]

In this case, change the ownership of those files from root to your login name would allow you to do whatever you want with those files, deleting them if you wish.

cd ~/examples
sudo chown username *

Replace username with your login name.

Or delete them with root privilege.

cd ~/examples
sudo rm *

OK thanks everyone. Lots to digest here..I do appreciate your advice/comments!

But when I enter what taurus said into terminal I get this. Why?

"mbdb@M2000:~$ cd ~/examples
bash: cd: /home/mbdb/examples: No such file or directory
mbdb@M2000:~$

[casmok]

there is no way to do it from the GUI, sorry at leat not in Ubuntu (you canot log in with Root)
from a gnome terminal

gksu nautilus

it will open the file manager with root access... what ever you delete will be gone forever, be careful

OK that worked pretty slick. Yes Ill be very careful but I dont think I need things like boring music clips or "fables"

Thanks

[protargol]

But when I enter what taurus said into terminal I get this. Why?

"mbdb@M2000:~$ cd ~/examples
bash: cd: /home/mbdb/examples: No such file or directory
mbdb@M2000:~$

You get that because the directory "/home/mbdb/examples" does not exist. The "~" just defines your home directory. Wherever your examples folder is is what you need to cd into.

I'm guessing that your mistake is a case-sensitivity one. Remember, case matters in linux. Examples is not the same as examples

Try this:

cd ~/Examples

Should work this time

[taurus]

OK thanks everyone. Lots to digest here..I do appreciate your advice/comments!

But when I enter what taurus said into terminal I get this. Why?

"mbdb@M2000:~$ cd ~/examples
bash: cd: /home/mbdb/examples: No such file or directory
mbdb@M2000:~$

Where is that directory?

ls -la ~